Diabetes mellitus affects nearly 26 million US adults with 1.5 million more cases diagnosed each year as noted by Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) in 2011. The CDC predicts that 1 in 3 Americans born in 2000 will develop diabetes in their lifetime. Diabetes is associated with multiple long term complications including premature cardiovascular disease, chronic kidney disease and diabetic retinopathy. Diabetic retinopathy and macular edema are the leading cause of new blindness diagnoses in the US. While millions of Americans have been diagnosed with diabetic and/or macular degeneration, a serious problem is that many more are unaware they are at high risk. One-third to one-half of people with diabetic and/or macular degeneration are undiagnosed and, hence, untreated. Although it has been shown that aggressive lifestyle intervention can delay or prevent diabetic and/or macular degeneration in those at high risk, it is also believed that earlier diagnosis and specific treatment of the eye disease either through laser photocoagulation or use of medications which block abnormal retinal vessel growth can prevent or delay the serious complications related to the disease (blindness) and improve health outcomes significantly. Since one third of people have a complication from diabetic retinopathy and/or macular degeneration at the time of diagnosis and duration of hyperglycemia is directly related to complications, earlier detection and intervention could have a significant impact on complication prevention.
In spite of considerable research into new methods to diagnose and treat this disease, diabetes remains difficult to treat effectively, and the mortality observed in patients indicates that improvements are needed in the diagnosis, treatment and prevention of this disease. There are multiple social and economic barriers to access to health care providers in the US and world-wide for earlier diagnosis and treatment and there is also a need for an improved approach to screen and classify the risk for future complications such as blindness from diabetes by utilizing new mobile technologies.